SBE Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grants

Linguistics
Division of Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences
Joan Maling, Program Director
Eric Potsdam , Program Director

Linguistics Dissertation Target Dates: January 15 and July 15

The program solicitation number for Doctoral Dissertations is NSF 06-605

Proposals for Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement Grants submitted to the Linguistics Program must comply with or include/provide information about the following bulleted items:

• Target Date: January 15 and July 15 , as for regular proposals
• Project Duration : Maximum 24 Months
• Project Budget : The maximum allowable budget is $12,000 (please see the solicitation for information on allowable expenses).
• Proposal Title should begin with, "Doctoral Dissertation Research..”
• Project Description must not exceed 10 single-spaced pages.
  PLEASE NOTE: This is a new page limit requirement. This page limit is recommended for July 2008 submissions, and will be required for all submissions as of January 2009.
• The “Results from Prior NSF Support” section is NOT required.
• The major professor should be listed as the Principal Investigator. The dissertation student should be listed as the Co-Principal Investigator.
• Proposers are reminded to identify the program solicitation number (NSF 06-605) in the program announcement/solicitation block on the proposal Cover Sheet.
• All proposals must be submitted electronically via Fastlane or Grants.gov.

* Note: Students doing international research, having a formal affiliation with a foreign research institution, may be eligible for additional funding. Please contact the appropriate program in NSF's Office of International Science & Engineering.

If you have additional questions, please contact the Program Director(s) listed above.

Dissertation Advice to Students

An outstanding dissertation proposal will clearly specify the leading research questions and hypotheses, the data relevant to answering those research questions, the theoretical framework being used and the methods of analysis. It will provide a brief literature review and a clear workplan. It will also address the NSF review criterion of broader impacts.

Follow the proposal preparation guidelines in the Doctoral Dissertation Program Announcement. Please note that the Linguistics Program allows 10 pages for the project description, single-spaced, otherwise follow the GPG for other general proposal preparation guidelines. As with any proposal, the summary must address in separate paragraphs the "intellectual merit" and the "broader impacts" as per the GPG.

Biographical Sketches should be submitted for both the student and the dissertation advisor and should conform to the GPG specifications. In addition, the biographical sketch for the student should also include a statement about the student’s current academic status and degree progress. Do not submit transcripts or letters of reference.

Do not attach any appendices unless you have received permission from the NSF program director. Proposals without explicit permission for appendices may be returned without review. Remember that reviewers are not obligated to read appendices, so critically important information should be in the body of the proposal. Letters testifying to local institutional sponsorship need not be appended but definitely should be cited in the proposal.